Analysis: Successful May has Minnesota United set up well for the second half of the season

The end of Minnesota United’s busiest period of the season is in sight. As the Loons head into their seventh game of nine in a 30-day period, Saturday at home against Austin FC, this month has already been a qualified success.

Minnesota has won five of the first six games of this stretch, including a memorable 4-1 win over Lionel Messi and Inter Miami. The Loons also won twice in the U.S. Open Cup, reaching the quarterfinals for just the fourth time ever (counting the days of the Minnesota Thunder, of course).

If it hadn’t been for an ugly 2-0 loss in Houston, May thus far would have been an unqualified success. And given the heat, humidity and general torpor inherent in a trip to Houston, manager Eric Ramsay was willing to perhaps sacrifice that game in the name of squad management.

“We’ve by design tried to make sure that we limit load and manage the midweeks well,” he said.

Maybe just as importantly, the Loons have managed those five wins in six games while also walking an extremely fine line: managing the minutes for their starters, while also building up some of their squad depth.

Over the past six games, 28 players have made an appearance for Minnesota, an astonishingly wide player pool. Eight players made the first starts of their MNUFC careers in one of the two Open Cup games.

Even if you take out the players who just appeared in the Open Cup, the Loons have still used 19 players in this period — and they’ve found a way to distribute the minutes, too.

Over that six-game, three-week period, Wil Trapp leads the team’s outfield players with 326 minutes, just over the equivalent of 3½ games. Behind him, fifteen other players have played 221 minutes or more — the approximate equivalent of 2½ games.

In other words, nobody has played too little, and nobody has played too much. Somehow, even after all these games, the Loons are attacking a final stretch of three games in eight days with a reasonably rested, fit and healthy squad.

“I feel like we’ve got past the worst of what this month was,” Ramsay said. “I think when you’re staring down the barrel of nine games in a little over three weeks or whatever, it seemed very significant, but I think now we’ve managed to use the mid-week games in an intelligent way. We’re in a good place and we can try and finish this week really strong because obviously it’s a defining week at this stage of the season.”

After Saturday’s home game, Minnesota heads to the Pacific Northwest for games against Vancouver and Seattle, two games the Loons are desperate to win. Minnesota wants to prove itself against Vancouver, the best team in the league this year, and Seattle remains Minnesota’s nightmare trip. The Loons are 0-10-0 there since joining MLS.

The Loons have a two-week break following Seattle, but then will play three games in June that take place during the Concacaf Gold Cup. That means four starters — Dayne St. Clair, Carlos Harvey, Tani Oluwaseyi and Joseph Rosales — are likely to miss three and perhaps even four games.

“I think we’ve obviously kept that period in mind when we’ve made these changes over the course of the last couple of weeks, and I know there will be players that will really benefit from that,” Ramsay said. “As we get into June and the inevitable difficulties that that period will bring, we are at least as well set as we can [be], bearing in mind the parameters of our squad and the depth we have. But this week has been really pleasing in that sense.”

In 2024, the combination of international departures and a lack of squad depth nearly sank the Loons’ season. This time around, the Loons are managing the same challenges much better. They’re already most of the way through May — and if they can get through to July without another swoon, they’ll be well positioned for the second half of the year.